KeokeN, makers of the acclaimed online game Ship Us Mars, has ceased operations fully and laid off its total employees.
In a put up to X on Tuesday, the studio stated it was shutting its doorways as a result of it couldn’t discover any writer for its ongoing work. The studio stated its representatives visited Recreation Builders Convention 2024 in San Francisco, a conference the place publishing offers are sometimes brokered, however got here residence empty handed.
Heartbroken, we have needed to lay off our crew at KeokeN due to nothing substantial materializing immediately after our go to to GDC. We’ve sadly exhausted all our attainable choices for publishing, work for rent, and co-development.
It’s our utmost precedence to ensure our… pic.twitter.com/3QHzJzgCfl
— KeokeN Interactive🐧 (@KeokeN) April 30, 2024
Ship Us Mars, which launched in February 2023 for Ps 4, PlayStation 5, Home windows PC, Xbox One and Xbox Collection X, was nicely acquired by recreation critics and featured within the prestigious Xbox Recreation Go and PlayStation Community month-to-month gaming choices that 12 months, which makes the studio’s closure all of the extra stunning.
Set in a post-apocalyptic world the place sources are scarce, gamers of Ship Us Mars needed to comb the moon’s floor within the first outing, and within the second installment, mined the Pink Planet to save lots of humanity.
Ship Us Mars crew laid off
The studio was apparently unable to discover a writer for the third installment of the “Ship Us” collection, to be known as Ship Us Residence.
The primary recreation, Ship Us the Moon and its sequel, Ship Us Mars each acquired very constructive rankings on Steam and a bunch of awards. The collection was a cult favourite with followers, who shared their sorrow on social media.
Posts like “Ship us Moon was an excellent recreation. Unhappy to listen to.” from @streamingdeluxe and @DevvyPrince’s “Ship Us Mars was one in every of my favourite video games I performed throughout 2023. Introduced me to tears so many instances. This message kills me to learn. Like many others, I’ll be desperate to help your future tasks!”
Regardless of the information, which provides to a prolonged checklist of studio layoffs throughout the previous 12 months, KeokeN chief government Koen Deetman stated he and managing director Paul Deetman remained dedicated to video games improvement. “Paul and I are closely beat, however removed from overwhelmed,” he wrote. “It’s our private mission to rebuild KeokeN brick by brick like we’ve accomplished earlier than, within the identify of our individuals and to proceed the legacy of our video games.“
Picture: KeokeN Interactive.